by Datechguy | December 31st, 2013
Then they would have been able to sail into the bay like this
Instead of being stuck like this:
— Chris Turney (@ProfChrisTurney) December 28, 2013
That first video comes from the Australian Antarctic Division department of the environment. Here is the YouTube description:
The SY Aurora anchored at Commonwealth Bay in 1912. The expedition, using the ship SY Aurora commanded by Captain John King Davis, departed from Hobart on 2 December 1911, landed at Cape Denison (named after Hugh Denison, a major backer of the expedition) on Commonwealth Bay on 8 January 1912, and established the Main Base. Cinematography by Frank Hurley.
Mind you this weekend CNN was covering the Chinese icebreaker that couldn’t get to them
The icebreaker Xue Long, or Snow Dragon, was just six nautical miles away from the Russian-flagged vessel when the captain decided the ship could not get any closer, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority said Saturday. The Snow Dragon went back to open water and remains in the vicinity of the stuck ship, the Akademik Shokalskiy, to provide support, said Andrea Hayward-Maher, spokeswoman for the AMSA. The Chinese vessel has a helicopter on board that could assist in evacuation. A French icebreaker was en route to assist, but AMSA called off that vessel’s mission at midday Saturday.
The CNN piece concludes with no small bit of Irony thus:
The expedition to gauge the effects of climate change on the region began November 27. The second, and current leg of the trip, started December 8 and was scheduled to conclude with a return to New Zealand on January 4.
But as What’s up with that notes, this hasn’t stopped these guys from fundraising off of their global warming trip:
Meanwhile, in the “Spirit of Mawson” Spirit of “never let a good crisis go to waste”, the folks on-board have realized the world is watching, and decided to make a pitch for money at their website, presumably to fund next year’s research media junket:
At Michelle Malkin’s site Doug Powers is also having fun with this:
So, what’s the carbon output of all these rescue ship and helicopters? I’m guessing they’re not solar powered. Turney runs a company called Carbonscape that aims to “fix carbon from the atmosphere and make a host of green bi-products, helping reduce greenhouse gas levels.” Well, he’s given himself a new carbon harnessing project to work on
and embeds this CNN video that doesn’t seem to get the irony here Nor did they anticipate this when they were tweeting on Dec 7th
and making their case
We are going south to: gain new insights into the circulation of the Southern Ocean and its impact on the global carbon cycle;
explore changes in ocean circulation caused by the growth of extensive fast ice and its impact on life in Commonwealth Bay;
use the subantarctic islands as thermometers of climatic change by using peats, lakes, trees and remains of the last ice age to explore the past;
investigate the impact of changing climate on the ecology of the subantarctic islands; discover the environmental influence on seabird populations across the Southern Ocean and in Commonwealth Bay;
understand changes in seal populations and their feeding patterns in the Southern Ocean and Commonwealth Bay;
produce the first underwater surveys of life in the subantarctic islands and Commonwealth Bay;
determine the extent to which humans have had an impact on this remote region of Antarctica; and provide baseline data to improve the next generation of climate models and predictions for the future.
At least they would have done these things if certain theories accepted as gospel about disappearing Antarctic were not shown to be disastrously wrong
Our rescue boat, the Xue Long, has had to turn back because the ice was too thick for it to get through. We’re now awaiting Aurora Australis
— Alok Jha (@alokjha) December 27, 2013
Looking at Alok Jha’s twitter feed he doesn’t seem to get the irony, but there are folks on twitter who do:
— Mark Buehner (@ElBuehn) December 27, 2013
And the daily mail is having a grand time with this headline:
Global warming scientists forced to admit defeat… because of too much ice: Stranded Antarctic ship’s crew will be rescued by helicopter
Chris Turney, a climate scientist and leader of the expedition, was going to document ‘environmental changes’ at the pole
In an interview he said he expected melting ice to play a part in expedition
Final thought, It’s the beginning of Summer in the Antarctic.
Update: The most interesting thing about this post is the number of comments that were pulled. Must be very frustrating when you can’t hide the decline.
Update 2: Headline at Michael Graham’s site:
Hilarious! Except for the fact that these failed climate models are the same ones used to annoy and hassle people like you and me. They’re the reason we’re getting stuck with expensive boondoggles like Solyndra, Evergreen Solar and wind farms.
And they’re the reason why the lighting in your house sucks so badly. Or will soon:
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